1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to communications and information sharing in joint and/or collaborative working environments. The invention is more particularly related to the use of chat box type communications devices anchored in a work artifact or an application. The invention is still further related to an anchored conversation that is detachable, movable between different applications, and capable of stand alone operations. The invention is also related to management of anchored conversations initiated by varied applications, including a database that maintains conversation logs and anchor histories of each conversation.
2. Discussion of the Background
In recent years a number of easy-to-use systems have become available that support synchronous and asynchronous communications between non-collocated individuals. Examples are chat, IRC, instant messenger applications (e.g. AOL Instant Messenger), MUDs, and MOOs (Evard, 1993; Curtis and Nichols, 1993). These systems have proven very popular within the workplace and many groupware platforms now include facilities which support synchronous chat applications (e.g. Lotus Domino (http://www.software.ibm.com/)).
Such systems support:
Quick and low effort contact despite geographic separation
Non-intrusive initiation of contact with others
The possibility for ongoing and frequent interactions
Communication with multiple people
Possibilities for multiple simultaneous conversations with different individuals/groups in different desktop windows.
An example implementation using IRC has the following characteristics. IRC is a network of chat server programs that support a simple protocol for text-based chat clients. There are add-ons for sound and graphics in the clients triggered by text keywords/commands. IRC clients for many operating systems (Windows, Unix, Mac) are available (e.g., mIRC). Using an IRC client program a user can exchange text messages interactively. When logged into a chat session, a user can “converse” by typing messages that are sent to other chat participants. Each IRC server provides a virtual meeting place. On IRC users meet others on “channels” (rooms, virtual places) to talk in groups, or privately. There is no restriction to the number of people that can participate in a given discussion or the number of channels that can be formed on IRC. All servers are interconnected and pass messages from user to user over the IRC network. One server can be connected to several other servers and up to hundreds of clients.
In the case of some MUDs and MOOs, conversations also have a persistent dimension so they enable the use of logs for catch-up and review. However, a common problem with most tools is that, whilst they support easy communications, they do not support the close integration of work artifacts and communications.
Conversations tend to occur in windows that are separate from, and have no connection or relationship to, the shared artifacts. This is illustrated in FIG. 1. In FIG. 1, a number of open windows, including a MUD chat window 110, can be seen on a computer display 100. Although conversants in the chat window share a communication context, they do not share a view of the work artifact(s) (e.g. Word files) under discussion. Working documents appear in separate windows.
This separation is a problem for certain kinds of collaborations, in particular collaborations that have been characterized as “tightly” coupled. Tightly coupled collaborations often involve problem solving with others through conversations over shared artifacts (e.g. whiteboards, models, documents, etc).
Conversations in tightly coupled collaborations have been characterized as “object laden” (Fleming, 1998); there is a high level of focus on the object or artifact that is under discussion and/or that is being co-constructed. Such conversations, therefore, work well in a shared context, i.e. that collaborators all have visual access to the artifact or object under construction or discussion. In Fleming's terms, the “object leads and language follows”. At the other end of the continuum, loosely coupled collaborations often involve elaborative conversations. Elaborative conversations are relatively independent of the material world and include instances of narration, argument and application. Here the “language leads and the object follows”, and the objects in such discourse tend to be fairly stable entities.
Evidence from interviews with collaborators who use chat applications and text-based virtual environments suggest that elaborative conversations are easy to achieve, but that “object laden” conversations are not. The latter require users to paste text into the shared chat window or to find some other means for sharing the specific content over which they wish to converse (Churchill and Bly, 1999).
Such pasting has the side-effect of taking the pasted-in material out of its context. For example, a paragraph taken from a document and pasted into a chat space no longer can be discussed in the context of the rest of the document. Reference to the rest of the document is then in the absence of the shared document.
Another option is to re-represent the entire artifact in the virtual environment and place both the artifact and users (in the form of avatars) into the virtual world. This is the approach taken in 2D graphical MUDs like the Palace (http://www.thepalace.com) and in 3D virtual environments like the MASSIVE environment where people and artifacts are represented as avatars and shared objects.
For example, in FIG. 2, a 3D graphical world is illustrated that contains a shared blackboard 200 and conversants that have been re-represented digitally as “block” avatars (210). Within simple 2D graphical virtual environments (e.g. the Palace), background images provide shared context. Task related backgrounds are created before virtual meetings can take place. The setting up of the conversation space and rendering of necessary objects in that space is costly time-wise, and represents a barrier to quick and easy contact, communications and collaborations.